Jay McShann: master of boogie-woogie piano

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Jay McShann, who was born James Columbus McShann on January 12, 1916 in Muskogee, Oklahoma, was one of the most innovative and hard-working jazz perfomers of the 20th century.

McShann was a pianist and bandleader whose style epitomised the blues-inflected jazz of Kansas City.

Along with the singer Joe Turner and Count Basie, McShann, the son of a furniture store worker, forged what came to be known as the Kansas City sound: jazz rooted in the blues, with a powerful rhythmic pulse. “You’d hear some cat play,” he told AP in 2003, “and somebody would say, ‘This cat, he sounds like he’s from Kansas City.’ It was Kansas City style. They knew it on the East Coast. They knew it on the West Coast. They knew it up north, and they knew it down south.”

In his early days, his band was regarded as a potential rival to Count Basie's, and it was as a member of McShann's band that the 20-year-old Charlie Parker made his recording debut.

McShann, universally known by the nickname "Hootie", was renowned for his mastery of the rolling boogie-woogie piano style and his brisk, unpretentious on-stage manner. In later life he developed a distinctive, hard-edged singing voice. One of his singing influences was Bessie Smith. "When I was young, the only blues record I ever heard was Bessie Smith. She had a blues that she did with, I believe it was James P. Johnson. Mississippi Delta Blues, I think they called that. 'It rained five days and the clouds turned dark that night. Trouble in the lowland that night'. And then she'd sing on down and holler, 'mmm I can't sing no more'. And all that stuff. She had it put together beautiful. And he was playing some nice blues behind her."

He attended Tuskagee Institute as a teenager and, wanting to play football, McShann enrolled at Fisk University, Nashville. But he was broke, dropped out and took hobo trains to Tulsa, where he bluffed his way into Al Denny's band, pretending he could read music. McShann is notable for being a largely self-taught musician. Growing up in the heartland of the blues, McShann imbibed the idiom from his earliest years, along with the dance tunes, ballads and popular songs of the day. He played with a number of local bands, notably the touring Eddie Hill Orchestra, and by the age of 20 was securely installed in Kansas City, the entertainment capital of the region.

Jay McShann

He formed his own band, a sextet, in 1937 and two years later doubled its size. At first the Jay McShann Orchestra toured almost exclusively in the south-west, known among musicians as the "Territory". Thanks to some transcription discs, recorded in late 1940 and accidentally preserved at a radio station in Wichita, Kansas, it is now possible to hear that remarkable young band, all in their early twenties.

As well as allowing a fascinating glimpse of Parker at the start of his career, these recordings help us to appreciate how much the drive and suppleness of south-western jazz contributed to the swing era and all subsequent jazz styles. In 1941 McShann signed a contract with Decca Records, which liberated him from the round of south-western territory gigs and opened the door to prestigious venues in New York, Chicago and other major cities. Charlie Parker's first official recording is his solo on McShann's Swingmatism.

In one respect the Decca contract was a liberating development, but Decca promoted the band as a purely blues outfit, with the emphasis on its vocalist, Walter Brown. When McShann's record of Confessin' The Blues, featuring Brown, unexpectedly sold half a million copies, the die was cast. While Basie forged ahead as a national attraction, McShann's records remained firmly confined to the "race music" category. Parker left in 1942. Nevertheless, the band secured its place at the top of the second rank of black orchestras regularly appearing at such prestigious venues as Harlem's Apollo Theatre.

With America's entry into the war, McShann was kept busy touring military bases and broadcasting over the Armed Forces Radio Service. The wartime draft, however, gradually removed original band members until, in 1943, McShann himself was drafted. By the time he was released the days of the big band were over. After briefly leading a trio in clubs along 52nd Street, McShann moved to California. There he recorded quite prolifically, in a kind of proto-rhythm and blues style, for numerous local labels, such as Capitol, Mercury, Swingtime and Philo-Aladdin. Some of the records were released under his own name and on some he acted as accompanist to singers, including such Kansas City veterans as Julia Lee and Big Joe Turner.

One session saw the recording debut of the blues singer Jimmy Witherspoon. In the early 1950s McShann returned to Kansas City and settled there for good, working occasionally as a soloist or with small bands in local clubs. A shrewd, amiable teetotaller, he had looked after his money and felt no need to rejoin the struggle. Apart from a trip to New York in 1957, to record with Witherspoon, he stayed quietly at home. Then, in 1966, a Capitol album suddenly appeared, entitled McShann's Piano.

This not only reminded the jazz world of his existence but coincided with an upsurge of interest in music of his era. He began appearing further afield and in 1968 made his first European tour. Thus began Jay McShann's second career. There was scarcely a jazz or blues festival at which he did not appear throughout the 1970s and 1980s. He developed a piano-and-vocal act of disarming simplicity, in which he rolled seamlessly from one tune to another, as if at random, with the occasional aside or anecdote thrown in.

In McShann's wake came further exponents of the south-western school, roused from retirement, one memorable example being Claude "Fiddler" Williams. The pair of them completely stole the show, in the face of all-star competition, at a vast open-air event held at Alexandra Palace in 1977. McShann's second career yielded far more recorded work than his first, not all of the finest quality, but much of it magnificent.

The 1976 album Kansas City Joys, with the saxophonists Buddy Tate and Paul Quinichette, plus Fiddler Williams at his most exuberant, is a classic, as is his solo set, Vine Street Boogie, recorded at the 1974 Montreux Festival. He is also featured in a number of films: Hootie's Blues (1978); The Last Of The Blue Devils (1979) and Confessin' The Blues (1987).

His song Confessin' The Blues showcased his songwriting abilities (there is a lovely version by BB King and it was the song with which Chuck Berry won a high school singing competition) and he always enjoyed his trips to Europe, including playing at the Capital Radio Jazz Festival in London in 1979.